Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Open Doors To My Studio

Hi, welcome to my studio. Today I give you a break from all this somewhat dry trend-research stuff and invite you to visit the four corners of my tiny studio! Here I am in front of my "homme debout" (the French call this kind of cupboard homme debout [om debouh]"standing man":) , it is full of yarns, ribbons, pearls and other treasures which I'll show you some other time. This is Oscar - in a couple of minutes he will jump onto the cardboard cupboard behind him, and then onto the "standing man" were a soft cussion waits for him. The cardboard cupboard is for journals, research material, printing paper, tissu swatches and waste tissu for painting purposes. In front of it is my mannequin, which I use sometimes when I paint t-shirts or "sculpture" fabrics.

This is the bed-corner, with a batik cover my brother brought me once from Mozambique and which I love. The little table is covered with books and journals (the coloured wonderful one is from Sue -Iwon it!and bits and bops.







These two are "miners", traditionally handcarved wood figures from "eastern" Germany.


This is an inbuilt cupboard, which I love cause it is hiding a mountain of treasures and also serves as a board where I stick things that I like. (Like a turquoise wonderful New-Year card from Sabrina, Cathies lovely daughter!)

This is all the stuff hidden in the cupboard, together with other stuff, and I love this kitten (I don't know who made it but I love it, it is a wood cut)


Hey, here comes my new "work-table", a present from my husband: a big oak board which he painted with transparent white colour. I just love it (Woodstock loves it too:)


The shelf holds all the things I need often but do not want on my work-table, such as brushes, little water bottles, ready to use acrylic colour which I mix and put in plastic containers so that they can be used for a long time,




under the shelf is a styroform board, it is for colour swatches and also for things friends gave me,
you can see Cathie's sun there and a card from Debbie,
and there is also a little blue Pokemon sitting under the shelf, a present from my stepdaughter Axelle and her dad, my husband (when we first met, 7 years ago, Axelle was 16 years old and she introduced me to the "Pokemons" on TV which we then watched together on Sunday mornings)

This is my little lucky owl and the clock, both watching over my time...

I hope you enjoyed this and I send you lots of love and good vibes, talk to you soon,
Andrea

18 comments:

sukipoet said...

Andrea this post is so cool. I love seeing your studio. Your cupboards and supplies. Your new table is wonderful. And even Oscar has a cushioned spot of his own. You know I always thought acrylics would dry out once out of the tubes or jars but what a good idea to mix the colors and store. Now that I think of it you can buy colors in jars too. I'll have to try it.

Your room seems to have a nice natural light in there too, something I am very sensitive too since my "studio" has little natural light.

By the by, I have read a # of Paul Auster's early books and own the movie made of one of his books, I think it's called Smoking or something like that--it takes place partly in a cigar store.

Nice to see you too full on, you look both sweet and sophisticated at the same time. Happy working. By the by, Sara at fabricofmeditation.blogspot.com just posted a bunch of photos of her newly renovated and tidied studio. Gorgeous.

Unknown said...

Suki, my studio seems so full of light cause it is painted white and has white shades, I had the shades down and I had 3 lamps on:) when taking the photos. But in fact it is one of the nicest room in the appartment cause it gets a lot of natural light too.
Nice to hear I'm looking sophisticated, you haven't seen the other 40 photos I took and threw away...LOL
I saw this movie "Smoke" and thought it was pretty cool. I have mixed feelings with regard to Paul Auster's books - to me they are fascinating and disappointing at the same time ...if that is possible,
Andrea
PS I'll pop over to Sara now to look at her studio:)

Donna said...

what a wonderfully organized space! It looks like everything has a home, which no doubt makes the tidy up that must be done once in a while much easier....

Unknown said...

Dear Quiltpixie, this space is so tiny and therefore it really needs organization, or els I'm getting crazy - and the others too (cat and husband). When I'm in "full paintpaperfabricmood", the bed is covered with paper, canvases are stapled on the ground under the window and there is another nice white board- table for the sewing-maching, which I put in front of the window. Maximized space I call it:)

Susan D said...

Thanks for the tour, I love to see what other peoples studios are like.

Cathie said...

Well -- how very lovely to see you in all your beautiful "red-headed" glory (Oscar too!) Your studio looks functional yet very warm and comfortable -- not to mention organized quite nicely.
You can tell alot about a gal by her studio!!! I like what I see.
Oh, and did I tell you -- you're gorgeous!!! XO
Cathie

Cris, Artist in Oregon said...

Well Andrea.. not much more I can say then what everyone else said. but Clevelandgirlie said it best. Nice to see you. You are gorgeous...and your creating room is wonderful. How many bedrooms do you have there? I hear apartments come small & expensive there. Is this true? Thanks for showing us your space. Makes you more REAL if you know what I mean. I really am loving your work you are doing. It took me a long time to get every thing downloaded to be able to see your blog so it took me forever to comment. Someday my DSL will come. Heck with the Prince just give me DSL. Grin

Natalya Khorover Aikens said...

your studio is fabulous and cozy at the same time, thanks for the tour. I love seeing where other people work, maybe I'll have to give the world a tour of my studio someday soon...

Anonymous said...

andrea, you are very pretty! and, i love your studio space, and might i add the little blue "creature" ,on your table,is a very nice touch! p.s. oscar is very cuddley-fuzzy looking. talk to you soon,
love always-
ms. bleu

TammyVitale said...

How fun is this post?! Just think you're all the way over there on the other side of the Atlantic and I still know what your creative space looks like. Goddess I love this medium! Thanks for all the time it took to put that together and share...you look great! good to see you from out behind the camera. =]

Lynn Cohen said...

What a delightful use of space Andrea. And what beautiful and interesting things you surround yourself with. I do love the black and white bed spread too. Lovely of your brother to pick that for you from so far away. What a nice surprise.

And you my dear are adorable and beautiful inside and out.
Hugs...LSKS

Anonymous said...

What a nice space you have to work in Andrea, thanks for the tour! It's always fun to see some one else's studio.

Karen Smithey said...

What a fun, fun post! Your studio looks so tidy! (Today's one of those days when nothing in my life seems tidy!)

And you! WOW!

Wurzerl said...

Deine Blumen-Kreation hat mir gut gefallen, aber dann entdeckte ich, daß ich doch beinahe diesen Klasse-Post, mit Andrea, Kater, Studio, Farben, Details übersehen hätte, ups, gerade noch mal gutgegangen, denn der Spaziergang durch Dein Reich, noch dazu mit so charmanter Führung hat sich gelohnt. Ich habe vorher gesehen, daß ich Dich noch gar nicht bei mir verlinkt habe.
Das darf ich doch nachholen, nicht daß ich wieder so einen Klasse Beitrag verschlafe!
Ich wünsche Dir einen schönen Sonntag, lieber Gruß vom Wurzerl

Elizabeth said...

Andrea, a great post!!! It is really wonderful to see you and your workspace... now we see what you look like, behind the camera :-) Beautiful, of course!
I liked seeing how you lay out your space and organise everything, always helpful. The idea of putting the acrylic paint in tubs is brilliant, I waste so much because mine dries out. Thanks.

Your new work is fantastic, getting better and better all the time. Nice to see that you have come back from the show and are really "giving it welly" (if that makes sense in French/German translation?).
Hugs. Lizzi

Debbi Baker said...

Hi Andrea!! I am just catching up as I missed so many posts. Wow what a lot of wonderful information and thinking you are sharing with us! I love your photos - so nice to see the whole you (!) and your lovely neat and organised studio - very impressive! I have my beautiful Chagall calendar up and I think of you every time I look at it. Bye for now,

Christine DeCamp said...

It is so nice to see your beautiful workspace--so clean & organized! I'm glad I didn't see this before I put mine online...I might not have posted it! I managed to get old studio really looking good for my Open Studio at Thanksgiving---of course, it meant covering up shelves full of supplies with white paper, so as soon as I got back to work, the "look" was gone. Now I don't have enough shelves, so I am still trying to figure out what I'm doing & where to put things. And BTW, you look FABULOUS, dahling!
Christine
http://passionforpainting.blogspot.com

Elis Cooke said...

great studio space and sooo much tidier than mine! I don't dare post pics of mine... people would be amazed anything good comes out of such a mess :) namaste Elis